The Port Arthur Massacre of 28th April 1996, was a killing spree by Martin Bryant at the historic Port Arthur, in eastern Tasmania, Australia. This event saw the implementation of law reform for gun control in both federal and state jurisdictions to remedy justice to future criminals. The media’s attention influenced change for future justice, establishment of political parties and charities led to support for victims of crime as well as ensuring the protecting of constitutional rights.
Prior to the Port Arthur Massacre, Australia had very lenient gun laws. The massacre of 35 people with an additional 23 wounded, pushed the then Prime Minister, John Howard, to reform the legislation associated with guns. Since then, firearm related deaths have declined by 47% . However, these statistics do not include illegally owned firearms, and there have been studies conducted showing that these laws have not made a difference.
For example, the University of Sydney found that Australia owns as many guns now as we did during the time of the Port Arthur Massacre, even though, due to amnesties and buybacks, there has been more than 1 million weapons destroyed since 1996 . Although, as Greg Cary, reporter at 4BC, stated the: “Buyback and amnesty were about getting rid of the kinds of weapons that were used at Port Arthur” . Nevertheless, the legislation was created so the community would feel safe. For example, the Government Buy-Back scheme, during 1996, was a compulsory surrender of
Martin John Bryant is an Australian mass murderer responsible for the Port Arthur Massacre in 1996. The Port Arthur Massacre was the third deadliest shooting by a lone gunman resulting in 35 deaths and 19 injuries. Bryant is currently serving 35 life sentences and 1035 years without parole in Risdon Prison in Hobart, Tasmania.
The response to the Gun laws created in 1996 were varied. Parties such as the Australian Shooters Party, and organisations such as the Alannah and Madeline Foundation were created after the Massacre at Port Arthur. These organisations, although very different, were both created due to that event at Port Arthur and the laws that followed. However the Australian Shooters Party can be seen as a controversial one, as their main aim is to redeem their rights to bear arms. However, this Party, and the people who oppose gun laws, still deserve to have their voice heard.
On April 20, 1914 a build up to tensions between union strikers and militia directed by the Rockefeller Coal Company came to a climax when the make shift town, called White City was attacked by militia. The Ludlow massacre was a build up of many different issues between the owners of the mines and the miners. Labor problems such as paternalism, lack of enforcement on current labor laws, and the slow recovery from the depression of 1890 all contributed to the actions of the Ludlow massacre in Colorado and the violence that was used after.
Much of the Federal legislation was implemented to comply with international terrorism treaties that Australia was party to (PA, n.d.-a). Examples of this legislation include ‘Chemical Weapons (Prohibition) Act 1994’, which complied with the Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production, Stockpiling and use of
Since the Port Arthur and the Monash University shootings in Australia, there has been a substantial reduction in the number of firearm homicides and firearm suicides, due to the gun law that was introduced by John Howard. The law restricted those who could own guns and the type of firearm. Due to this law, homicide rates in Australia are only
Gun violence has been a massive issue through the modern age of humanity and has created a sense of division regarding the solution to this epidemic. In Adam Gopnik’s essay “Shootings”, Gopnik addresses the issue of gun violence and demands a change in American government policy to prevent the tragic killings of innocent lives. Gopnik harnesses the tool of emotion and passion to drive his essay. In Charles Cooke’s essay “Gun Control Dishonesty”, Cooke takes the polar opposite of Gopnik’s approach by utilizing factual evidence to prove the futility of gun control.
The central legal concern associated with mass murder has been gun control. More specifically the aftermath of Columbine can be examined to show the range of gun control concerns. A result of the Columbine massacre, the most terrible mass shooting in United States history, was the media calling for more gun control and identifying too many guns and too little control as the cause of the attack (Kelck, 2009). It is important to note that while this attack was horrendous, it comes nowhere close to the number of victims in
It held many struggles and disagreements, which lead to many retaliations, from both the Indians and the settlers. The Indians had been alliances with the white men until the massacre, which stated the settlers betrayal to all tribes.
This essay will ultimately contend that the Sentencing Amendment (Coward 's Punch Manslaughter and Other Matters) Act 2014 is an ill-founded initiative made by legislators, giving the impression of a powerful Government without truly reducing the violence. Using a close reading of each provision of the legislation in unison with extrinsic materials, this piece will outline the efficacy, necessity and likely impacts of the Act.
In 2000, nearly 30,000 people died due to uncontrollable gun violence, even though the US has many gun laws. Gun control is now one of the main political issues because of all the shootings in the past decade. There have been many studies taken on gun control, which shows more gun-control decreases deaths with a gun involved.
This essay investigates the Australian gun laws and whether they are effective or not. In particular, with a focus on what the current gun laws are and how they have or have not worked also if they need to be updated. The current gun laws were first introduced by John Howard in 1997 after the mass shooting in Port Arthur where 35 people were killed and a further 18 injured on the 28th of April, 1996 (Sharpe, 2016), the laws were them further improved in 2002, after the Monash University shooting, where a commerce student with mental impairments came in to class armed with 6 loaded handguns, 2 students died and an additional 5 were injured (ABC News, 2015). It has been almost 20 years since the introduction of the current gun laws, the essay
Although The Sand Creek Massacre is known for occurring on November 29, 1864 there are specific reasons this incident happened and they all take place before 1864. It all started during the 1850’s, where the the gold and silver rush brought many white settlers near the Rocky Mountains and the surrounding foothills. This event is known as the Pike’s Peak Gold Rush of 1658 which angered many people known as the Cheyenne and Arapaho Indians. They soon began attacking the white men which caused the number of soldier to decrease this then led to the Colorado War of 1863-1865.The battle began to get out of hand that territorial governor John Evans sent a Militia Commander known as John M. Chivington. Now this man was very well known for his passion of extinguishing all of the Indians once he was let in the clergy. The Civil War raged in the east in the spring of 1864 where Chivington launched a violent campaign against the Cheyenne and their allies. The troops attacked any and all Indians and their villages, but the Cheyenne were joined by Arapaho, Sioux, Comanche, and Kiowa in Colorado and Kansas, went on a defensive warpath. Evans and Chivington then raised the Third Colorado Cavalry which was a reinforced militia of short term volunteers who went by the name of “hundred Dazers.” It was a summer of scattered clashes and small raids, but the Cheyenne and Arapaho were finally ready for peace. The Indian representatives then met with Evans and Chevington on September 28, 1864 at
The Australian (2013) reported about a man who shot at workers at the naval headquarters in Washington and killed 12 innocent people. It also says that in America the murder rate related to gun shooting is three times more than other countries. These all are just due to easier gun laws and more access to them. As the U.S President Barack Obama said “The main difference that sets our nation apart, what makes us so susceptible to so many mass shootings is we don’t do enough, we don’t take the basic common sense actions to keep guns out of the hands of criminals and dangerous people.” (The Australian , 2013)
Every so often the media and news feeds flood with reports of a mass shooting. Families mourn. In the days that follow, calls to action can be heard, and there is a demand for change. Sometimes minor legislation passes, but in the United States extreme change is rarely seen. Other developed nations provide an opposite comparison. Following the Port Arthur shooting in Australia and the shooting in Great Britain, both countries organized for significant gun reform.
With the diversity of the mass media and technology, it is easy to access to any information with just a click of mouse. The news article is going to be analysed called ‘The wake-up call: The gun-running syndicate that shocked Australian law enforcement’. This article is the information about crime operation. In this article, there are many subtitles to highlight the feature events’ timelines, containing various small paragraphs, quotes and videos to support the subtitles. The purpose is to inform any public individual interested in crime news about how the gun smuggling has been occurred regularly around Australia. The article is written in formal language with many words related to crime. Unsurprisingly, there are numerous nominal groups used in the article showed how academic it is such as “one of the biggest gun-smuggling operations in Australian history”, “A syndicate working out of a suburban Sydney post office”, “the discovery of a pistol on the floor of the car”, and so on. Alongside of nominalisation, simple past and present tenses are widely used in this article as it states the facts and past occurrences.